Of Mites and Iron Men
by Moira Colleen
Summary: When Loki Bee unleashes a swarm of mites upon the hapless citizens of Manhivean, Iron Bee must seek help from his counterpart, Iron Bear, and his allies.
Iron Bear is hard at work in his workshop, loudly singing along with Black Sabbath, when suddenly the music goes silent.

"Forgive the interruption, sir," says JARVIS, "but I thought you should know I have detected an energy anomaly on the roof of the Tower."

"What kind of energy?" Iron Bear asks, setting aside his soldering iron.

"It is too early to say for certain, but all signs thus far indicate the formation of an Einstein-Rosen Bridge."

"But Thor Bear is already here," says Iron Bear.

"The energy readings do not appear to originate from Asgard, sir," says JARVIS.

Iron Bear rubs his forehead. "Great," he says. "Yet another portal to who-knows-where on the roof. What part of 'private landing pad' do people not understand?

"Better assemble the Bearvengers," Iron Bear says. He summons his armor and flies to meet the others at the site of the anomaly.

By the time everyone arrives, the energy has become visible as a golden-yellow hexagon that grows larger too quickly for anyone to do anything but watch. In a matter of seconds it reaches the size of a full grown grizzly, and then, all of a sudden, something starts to come through.

The Bearvengers assume battle positions, weapons at the ready. To their astonishment, what comes through the portal is not some monstrous enemy, but a giant bee covered from antennae to stinger in red and gold armor.

"Whoa, there, Power Rangers," the stranger says, holding up four of his six legs in a placating gesture. "I come in peace."

"Who are you?" Captain Ameribear demands.

"You can call me Iron Bee," says the bee. "I'm here because I need your help."

"What kind of help?" says Bucky Bear.

"As you might have guessed," says Iron Bee, "I come from an alternate universe. We have our own Manhivean Island, our own Beevengers, you get the idea. Unfortunately, that means we also have our own Loki Bee. And—lucky us!—Loki Bee just unleashed a swarm of mites that's threatening to infect the entire planet."

"Even in other worlds, still my wayward brother works his mischief," Thor Bear laments.

"We have Loki Bee in custody, and so far the infestation is confined to Manhivean," says Iron Bee. "But quarantine or not, it's just a matter of time before the mites spread to the rest of the city, and from there they'll infect the whole world.

"The cure should be fairly simple, though," says Hulk Bear, currently in the form of Bruce Bearner. "A coating of powdered sugar will make it impossible for the mites to hold on, and once they fall off you can vacuum them up so they can't latch onto anyone else."

Iron Bee sighs. "Unfortunately, Loki Bee knows that, too, so he contaminated our sugar supply with a kind of starch that contains gluten."

"Which means that millions of bees can't use it or they'll get even sicker," finishes Falcon Bear.

"Bee Banner is immune to the mites, and War Machine Bee and I were protected by our armor," says Iron Bee, "but almost all the other Beevengers were affected before we knew what was happening. Bee Banner and War Machine Bee are treating as many victims as they can, but there's no quick way to test to see which packages of sugar are contaminated, and as long as Manhivean is under lockdown, there's no way to get any that we know is safe."

"Where can we even get powdered sugar at this time of night?" says Hawkbear.

The Bearvengers think hard for a moment.

"Wait," says Bear Widow. "Isn't Pepper Bear gluten intolerant?"

"That's right!" shouts Iron Bear. "And she likes to bake sometimes, too!"

"And I know where she keeps the baking supplies," says Bucky Bear.

The Bearvengers and Iron Bee make their way down from the roof to the kitchen. There, in the back corner of the baking cupboard, they find two full bags of powdered sugar. Bruce Bearner, Iron Bee, and Iron Bear each take a turn reading the ingredients: cane sugar, corn starch. They declare it safe; then the heroes return to the roof, where the portal still waits.

"Thanks for your help—" Iron Bee starts.

"We're not done here," Captain Ameribear cuts him off. "We're going with you. There's no way you can treat the whole island of Manhivean all by yourself."

"And if you'll wait just a second," Iron Bear adds, "I happen to have just the invention to help suck up all those mites."

Iron Bee tries to argue, but Captain Ameribear is already giving the Bearvengers their orders. Iron Bee's armor does something that makes the portal large enough to let everyone go through all at once, and then they get to work.

Though she's still obviously feeling unwell, Pepper Bee arranges a press conference to instruct the entire population of Manhivean to gather in Central Park. Once the crowd has gathered, Iron Bee, Iron Bear, Falcon Bear, Thor Bear, and War Machine Bear take to the skies to distribute the sugar over as wide an area as possible.

The sugar falls like snow over the hundreds of thousands of assembled bees, making them look like an army of ghosts. Some, especially the larvae, complain, but before long the mites start to drop from their bodies.

Then the rest of the Bearvengers move in with Iron Bear's special vacuums—originally designed to keep dust out of a laboratory—and suck up the fallen mites into containment tanks for further study.

When the last of the mites is captured, the Bearvengers return to Beevenger Tower. Pepper Bee in particular tries to convince them to stay until the quarantine is lifted, so they can be rewarded for their heroism, but Captain Ameribear insists that the real hero is Iron Bee for his brilliant solution in creating the portal to get the cure in the first place.

They do accept the large bottle of Asgardian Bee honey offered in thanks by Thor Bee, though.

 **Inspired by the adventures of the Bearvengers in Lauralot's** ** _Alexander Pierce Should Have Died Slower_** **series on AO3**


End file.
